All student enrolment numbers are provisional until the start of the semester. Currently, 3,800 new students have enrolled in bachelor’s degree programmes at ETH Zurich. However, it remains uncertain whether all of them will actually start their studies.
As in previous years, the proportion of women students remains around 35 percent. The share of students who begin their studies at ETH Zurich with a Swiss Matura also remains unchanged – at around 80 percent. The majority of the 700 international students enrolling in a bachelor’s degree programme continue to come from Germany and Austria, followed by France and the UK.
Which degree programmes are particularly popular?
Mechanical Engineering remains the most popular discipline, with enrolment up by 10 percent with around 800 incoming bachelor’s degree students.
First-year student preferences have shifted this year. While Computer Science enrolment saw a 15 percent decline, interest in Electrical Engineering and Information Technology surged by 27 percent. “Although there’s a slight decline in applications, roughly 350 students are still opting to study Computer Science at ETH Zurich. In the era of AI, a solid foundation in Computer Science is more essential than ever,” ETH Rector Günther Dissertori notes.
By contrast, enrolment figures for the bachelor's degree programme in Environmental Sciences have once again fallen significantly. Last year, only around 100 students had enrolled for the bachelor’s degree programme. The figure looks set to fall by more than a third again this year.
Many applications – studies remain in high demand
While estimating undergraduate enrolment at the start of the semester is straightforward, precise figures for students at the master’s degree level are still pending because their matriculation is finalised at a later date.
ETH Zurich’s master’s degree programmes continue to attract strong interest, as evidenced by 8,200 applications – an approximate 18% increase from the previous year. Around 3,200 of applicants have been admitted, although not all have accepted the offer of a place. This means that only about a quarter will actually start their studies at ETH Zurich, with just under 1,900 new students expected to embark on their master’s degrees this year.
Most international students starting their master’s degrees at ETH Zurich come from Italy, Germany and the Netherlands. Although applications from the US and Canada increased this year, master’s enrolments from North America are not expected to rise significantly. In 2025, 75 master’s students from the US began their studies at ETH Zurich.
ETH Rector Günther Dissertori commented on the new figures, saying: “These numbers underscore the enduring appeal of an education at ETH Zurich. While I understand some students are concerned about bleaker job prospects, I am fully convinced that an ETH Zurich degree is a valuable investment. Our students learn to analyse complex problems, contextualise new developments and independently devise solutions. These are skills that will always be in high demand.”
ETH Zurich remains a highly attractive destination for young people in the upcoming semester. In 2025, the university welcomed approximately 11,520 bachelor’s and 10,144 master’s degree students. Including doctoral candidates, the total enrolment reached just under 27,000 students from roughly 130 countries.